El Citera

Concrete vats and lake-country timing

Hand harvests set the pace for Ambra Zanetti, winemaker at El Citera in Peschiera del Garda, where Turbiana comes in from the estate’s La Vecia plot and the cellar keeps to concrete. She has held the role since 2010, long enough for the same ground to become a working vocabulary rather than a backdrop. The Zanetti family first planted a vine here in 1927, on clay soils near Lake Garda, and the estate still reads as an agricultural holding before it reads as a brand. Zanetti’s station sits between the vineyard and the vats: selecting fruit, protecting the line of the must, and letting the wine take its time without oak imposing another accent. The lineage made public here is family continuity, not a named school of training. That matters because the craft at El Citera depends on staying close to the property, season after season, and accepting how slowly a small estate teaches its maker. Peschiera del Garda gives the work its lake air, its clay, and its restraint.

Lugana held in neutral stone

El Citera works around Turbiana, the grape behind its Lugana DOC, and around a cellar choice that shapes the house signature: concrete vats. The estate describes hand harvesting with grape selection, then extraction of the finest must before fermentation in concrete. For L’Artigianale, the wine ages for 24 months in concrete vats, followed by 3 months of bottle refining. The estate also speaks of refining guided by the phases of the moon, a method that belongs less to display than to timing, patience, and the old agricultural habit of watching natural cycles. The clay-rich soil of La Vecia is credited by the family with fresh apple notes and persistent minerality. Concrete keeps the wine away from oak’s grain and sweetness, so the bench-side decisions remain exposed: fruit condition, must selection, fermentation, and the length of aging. In a DOC often associated with dry still whites made for freshness, El Citera stretches the method toward a slower register without leaving Turbiana behind.

The cellar beside the vines

The place is quiet in the way small wineries can be quiet: the useful noise belongs to work, not performance. Around Strada Berra, the vineyard sits in the countryside of Peschiera del Garda, close to Lake Garda and rooted in clay that changes character with water, harsh in dry weather and generous after rain. The tasting room and cellar do not need theatrical polish to explain the estate. The explanation is already in the concrete, the hand selection, the family name, and the repeated return to Lugana. El Citera’s atmosphere is rural and calm, with the vineyard close enough that the cellar feels like the next room of the same task. The estate’s sustainable philosophy is expressed through attention to the earth rather than through a long public list of certifications.

L’Artigianale as the fixed point

The wine to hold in mind here is Lugana L’Artigianale DOC, the named bottling tied to Zanetti’s public work at the estate. It gathers the place into one disciplined sequence: Turbiana from La Vecia, hand harvest, concrete fermentation, 24 months in vat, then 3 months in bottle. El Citera’s next statement is likely to come through the same vessel and the same grape, because the estate’s clearest language remains L’Artigianale.